


Like a Thief in the Night

by Fyre



Category: The Queen's Thief - Megan Whalen Turner
Genre: Missing Scene
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-24
Updated: 2017-12-24
Packaged: 2019-02-19 12:54:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,466
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13124136
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fyre/pseuds/Fyre
Summary: Once a Thief, now a King, Eugenides knows the palace of Attolia better than anyone, even his wife, the Queen.





	Like a Thief in the Night

**Author's Note:**

  * For [neutrophilic](https://archiveofourown.org/users/neutrophilic/gifts).



“But you don’t need to.”

Irene considered her husband by the light of the lamp beside the bed. Even after two weeks of marriage and all the formalities and pomp that had surrounded it, there was something so simple and personal about the word. Her _husband_. “There are many things I don’t need to do. I don’t ask because I need to.”

Eugenides cocked his head. He was sprawled in her bed, tangled in the sheets, flushed and sated and sleepy. A perfect time, she had thought, to press her wishes on him. “Then why?”

She touched her hand lightly to his chest, her fingertips brushing the scar that her men had given him some two years earlier. She felt his heartbeat pick up and fought a smile. “Can a wife not wish to come to her husband?”

The grin that spread across his face swept away the fatigue – he seldom slept, she knew that well enough now – and he covered her hand with his. “Admit it,” he said, stroking his fingers from her knuckles to her wrist, touch light as a feather. “You want to know how I do it.”

She arched an eyebrow. “I am a dutiful wife who wishes to visit my husband.”

He burst out laughing and caught her hand, lifting it to his lips. “You’re a wonderful liar,” he said, grinning into her palm. He planted a kiss against her palm, then another to each of her fingertips. “But you still want to know how I do it.”

“I’m curious,” she admitted. “Thieves are said to possess the skill to disappear and move through solid walls.” He snorted loudly. “So, so, so,” she agreed with a curl of her lips. “Which leads to the question of how you do it.”

He pushed himself up on his elbow, lifting his hand to cup her cheek. “You’ve seen it yourself.”

She tilted her head into his touch. “Misdirection, diversion, sleight of hand. That doesn’t show me how you walk through my palace without drawing the attention of my guards.”

He pushed himself upright and kissed her. It was foolish how easily it made her stomach flutter and her body warm from head to toe. Gods have mercy, she was not some young doe-eyed maid, but sometimes, he made her feel like she was once more. 

Of course, he could not simply let her enjoy the pleasure he brought her without his merciless teasing.

“Your guards,” he murmured against the corner of her lips, “aren’t very good.”

She pressed her hands against his chest and shoved him back down onto the bed, where he lay and laughed at the ceiling. He tucked his hand behind his head and smiled up at her. 

Irene lifted her own hands to draw back her hair, which had been left tousled by his fingers and was curling wildly over her shoulders. “You _will_ show me,” she murmured.

His eyebrow quirked up in a playful mirror of her own. “Did you ever doubt it?” He smothered a yawn with his forearm, then beckoned her with the bare stump of his arm, self-consciousness forgotten if only for a moment.

Irene blew out the lamp then lay down beside him, drawing the sheets back around them. Pale fingers of moonlight edged the room in silver and she laid her head on Eugenides’s shoulder, one hand coming to rest against his chest again.

“I would give you the moon,” he murmured. He sounded so drowsy, she wondered if he even realised he was speaking aloud. “Steal it from the sky.”

“I know,” she murmured, “but I have no need for the moon.”

He pressed a sleepy kiss to her hair. “Tomorrow, then. I will give you your palace.”

______________________________

Irene’s skirts were an unexpected impediment.

It wasn’t if Eugenides _hadn’t_ thieved while wearing long formal robes, but there was a difference between a robe and layered gowns encrusted with gems. For one thing, it made it even more of a challenge, especially when Irene defiantly put out her chin and said she would not go running through her own palace in her underthings. 

That was an image that Eugenides knew he would enjoy on the nights when he couldn’t share her bed.

The challenge was good, though. It was _fun_. He knew the palace of Attolia so well he could have crept through it in his sleep. Now, he had to pause and take stock and work out the options for his wife and if they were caught together, then all their plans could easily be shattered.

Even in the depths of night, there were lamps lit in the upper levels of the palace. Light could fall on a flash of gem and catch the eye of a guard halfway down a hall. Shadows were their allies and he knew the rotations of the guards like he knew the back of his palm. That, he mulled, might prove a weakness in their security, however convenient it might be for him.

Irene clearly thought so too as he led her across one of the wider corridors only seconds after one of the guards had marched by, armour polished and gleaming with patriotic zeal. She tightened her grip on his wrist and he glanced back, to see her frowning in the direction that the guard had gone.

Eugenides’s lips twitched. Well, she was the one who wanted to see how the magician performed his disappearing act. It wasn’t as if he hadn’t told her, even if she hadn’t believed him. He cocked his head at her, all innocence, as if he couldn’t understand why she would be upset and had to stifle a snicker when she gave him one of her glacial looks. It wasn’t quite frosty enough and when she pinched his wrist in reproof, he had to stifle the laughter in his sleeve.

A clatter of footsteps nearby reminded him that there was time for teasing later. He tugged his wrist against her hand, leading her down one of the narrower servants’ corridors. They were usually empty so late at night, but it didn’t hurt to be cautious. When he froze, he felt her do the same and smiled. Even half-carrying the weight of her skirts in her other hand, she moved lightly. Not quite as quietly as a thief, but well enough.

A third turn into a corridor, a shortcut through an unused guest chamber, a quick step from one broad balcony to another. Once, a guard called out and he felt her go rigid – fear, anger, annoyance at being caught – but Eugenides recognised that tone and that voice. He tugged his wrist again. The voice wasn’t for them. 

After the first time, it became easier to recognise that particular tone. If Irene was ever caught alone, she would never hear it quite the way he did. No one could fail to see who she was. She certainly would never receive the shouts and fury he’d heard in his time. 

Another turn down a set of stairs and crossing to one last balcony, an impossibly wide space away, if not for those conveniently positioned outcrops, from which banners were unfurled on special occasions. Enough for a single foot to step upon, but barely. 

Irene froze there. Eugenides wasn’t surprised. For someone not born in Eddis – or a thief – the drop looked terrifying, a sheer plummet onto the crags upon which the citadel stood. She was staring at the outcrops, her grip iron-tight on his wrist. He watched her, then moved a little closer, close enough to breathe a whisper in her ear.

“That’s how I do it.” He touched his lips to her earlobe and the ruby-and-gold square hanging from her lobe. “So you don’t have to.”

She shivered. “Is it the only way?”

“The quickest.”

She turned to look at him, eyes turned silver in the moonlight. “Show me another.”

 

_____________________________________________

 

Irene swept from the great hall, her attendants in her wake. 

It was a trial at times to watch Eugenides play the role that her court saw in him. Few – if any of them – cared to know their King and he was masterful at playing the part. He had done so before, he admitted cheerfully on one of their nightly ventures through her palace. He’d even served as a kitchenboy for months. She had stared at him in disbelief. 

“When?”

“After the gift.” He didn’t show an ounce of shame. 

“My kitchens? Why?”

He lifted his shoulders in a shrug. “Your bakers are better than the ones we had in Eddis.”

He was lying then, cheerfully, but now she knew how to recognise them. Days and weeks of watching and listening and knowing him had taught her that. He lied to everyone, but no one else knew to look for the lie in the fool. 

Tonight had been no exception. The Barons were all present and so, Eugenides was even more of an ass than usual. She had watched them watching him and the smug, self-righteous smirks some of them wore. Others – those sympathetic to her – looked to her with pity, which was almost as bad. Gods above, if they knew what manner of man sat on the throne, they would never have dared…

And he knew it and he ran from it, over and over again. 

He feared it, feared what he would be taking from her, even though she knew it would only make them stronger for it. 

Almost without thinking, she reached the doors of her chamber. Her attendants opened the doors for her and started fluttering about her, reaching for her hair and the stays of her dress. They had only removed the outer gown when she raised her hand. “Leave me.”

She saw the looks they exchanged, but they were obedient to a fault, filing out of the room. She closed the door behind them, turning the key in the lock. Eugenides would loiter in the banquet hall. He always did to give her attendants time to finish the disrobing and readying her for bed.

Perhaps, she thought, it was time to remind them that they were equals, whether before the eyes of their people or in the privacy of their bed. 

It took only moments to slip out of her room unseen, moving lightly on bare feet through the halls of the palace. At one of the junctions, she heard her King’s voice among the chorus of his attendants. From the shadow of a pillar, she watched as he was hurried along, looking more and more put-upon. They would be at his room before she could get there at the pace they were going.

Irene’s heart thumped. There were other ways, slower and easier, but she had seen the look in his eye, the frustration and the roiling ill temper. If she could reach his chambers first, if she could surprise him as often as he surprised her, then it might be enough to cheer him up. She glanced about, then changed direction, flitting through the halls down the first path he had shown her.

The stone of the floor was cool underfoot and when she emerged onto the final balcony, her skin was a rash of goosebumps, but there were no lights in the attendants’ chamber yet, which meant she was still ahead of them. She looked across the space between herself and the balcony beneath his window – the window he would look to as soon as he entered the room. 

The drop was no less terrifying on second sight, but the light from his chamber cast shadows and she could see where there were ledges above the footholds, enough to grip on. Her hands shook as she touched the balustrade, her heart pounding.

“Eugenides,” she prayed in a whisper. “I know I am no Thief, but I do this for him. Please do not let me fall.”

Nothing seemed to change, but the fear receded and when she stretched out her foot for the first narrow ridge, it felt far wider than it looked. Her fingertips curled along the handholds and she inched, little by little until both feet were on the ledge and the world far below. If she looked down, she knew she would never move again.

A warm breeze, barely a breath, curled around her. A voice, impossible and close, whispered, “Go. You’re safe.”

How she went from the first ledge to the lip of the balcony, she could not say, but her legs sagged beneath her as soon as she dropped down from the balustrade. Her heart fluttered like a trapped bird and she stared out over the void she had crossed. For a moment, only a moment, she could have sworn she felt hands on her shoulders, holding her steady, but to think on that and let the thought swallow her whole was enough to make her run mad.

A crash within the room made her whip around, staring in through the glass. Her husband – as she expected – was looking straight at the window.

Eugenides’s eyes were round as the moon.

“Out!” He didn’t even turn to face his attendants. “Now!”

One of them must have protested, for he roared it again and slammed the doors behind them. As Irene approached the glass, she could see how much his hand was trembling as he slid the bolts home, then he turned and looked at her again, as if he half-expected her to vanish.

She smiled tentatively, pressing her hand to the glass, the pane misting around her splayed fingers, all she could do to assure him she was really there.

Eugenides stumbled across the room to the window, fumbling with latch. When the window swung inwards, there was another rush of that warm breath of air and for a split-second, he reared back as if he felt exactly what she had felt out there on the ledge.

“You came,” he whispered and all at once, he caught her in his arms, burying his face in the crook of her neck. He was trembling as much as she was. “Irene…”

She wrapped her arms around him, sinking her fingers into his hair. Her words were gone, scattered by that breeze, but she was here and he needed her here and that was all that mattered. 

She couldn’t say how long they stood there, holding each other in the half-open window, but she could feel the tension easing in his body and his warm breath on her throat turned to small butterfly kisses. His hand spread low on her back, then curled, fingers bunching the cloth that separated them.

“Never in your undergarments,” he whispered against her shoulder. “That’s what you said.”

Her lips found his ear in the quiet dark of the chamber. “I lied,” she whispered.


End file.
